38 Comments

How safe is sleeping in bear country?@CsBalazsHungary In the Sierra Nevada (Yosemite, Sequoia) the rangers put up tons of pictures of car doors that bears have yanked off in order to get at the food inside. I wouldn't leave it in the car :-)

Aug6

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Yellowstone back country camping trip?Even if you don't see the bears, preparing for them, and obeying the (sensible, IMO) rules and regulations about food-because-of-bears is something that west coast hikers should be aware of.

Jul17

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Hiking possibilities near Silicon Valley@NateEldredge I'm not objective, being the one asking, but there are many similar questions on this site (some of which I've asked) and they've been enormously helpful. For remote destination they may be too specific, but canonical answers to popular destinations seems a good idea to me. As for books - of course they exist. But this site is often used to direct people to the book (or the section within a book) that will be most useful in answering their question.

Jun27

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Trekking near BerlinI ended up going to "Märkische Schweiz". Two days, sleeping at a hotel in Buckow in between. It was beautiful and convenient. Like @PaulPaulsen wrote - it's not remote, rugged wilderness, but still very pretty. You can swim in the lakes, too.

May26

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Trekking near Berlin@Paul No, your answer is fine (and very appreciated), but as you wrote, I'm just hoping for answers and opinions from more people, if possible.

Trekking near Berlin@Paul Ideally, in huts/hotels/hostels ... we won't be bringing camping and cooking equipment with us. As for the scenery, it doesn't have to be mountainous forests, but it should be pretty enough that it makes sense to walk there during a visit to Germany, the kind of place that similarly-inclined tourists from other countries in Europe might go to.

Are headaches a bad sign at altitude?I think gaining 1000 meters/day is too high to be a sustainable pace. All the high-altitude treks I've done had a rate that averaged no more than 500 meters/day- if you go from 3000 to 5000 meters in two days, your chances of being OK are nil.

Trek-able peaks in the himalayan rangeI was in Ladakh at the base camp for Stok Kangri a few months after doing the EBC. It definitely seemed a more difficult undertaking, a different class of hard. The EBC is touristy and crowded, sure, but has its charms.

Aug9

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Backpacking in southern NY or PACan you add more details to your question? One thing that can help is what kind of trail you're looking for - for example, how long, what time of year, how many days, where you plan on sleeping (especially if you want to avoid campgrounds). That will help people to know whether their proposed route is suitable. Another thing is which resources you've used already to try to find a trail, so people can suggest resources you might not be familiar with.

Jul28

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Trekking poles on planesThe security staff at Budapest didn't seem to care about the poles ... but who knows what the next flight will bring?